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In 1852, the abolitionist Frederick Douglass asked an audience what the Fourth of July should mean to a population of enslaved African Americans. Forty-eight years later, still pondering the question of “independence” for the formerly enslaved, a group of black researchers attempted to quantify the answer in sociological terms. Among this study group was the noted scholar W.E.B. Du Bois and Booker T. Washington , a man normally billed as Du Bois’ intellectual rival. Together, they worked...

Lois Thetford, a physician’s assistant in the UW’s MEDEX Northwest program, is currently developing a course for the UW’s Health Sciences program that focuses on homelessness. The two-credit class will be offered during winter 2017 and will feature input from staff members of the health sciences. The class will explore homelessness through various lenses, such as “homelessness and racism,” to give students a better understanding of the reality of homelessness for those that live it. Thetford...

Last night, with the developmental coping skills of a four year old, she:

I am writing to inquire about representation for a class action lawsuit or other suit structure related to trauma-informed policy and racial justice. I recognize you are not a "legal firm" and also recognize the connections you may have from the tireless work you do on behalf of people of African ancestry. While it may be most productive to discuss the strategy rather than read/write about it, I will briefly outline some of the theory here. Specifically, as an educational psychologist it is...

The persistency of state-sponsored and state-sanctioned violence against people of color in the United States is largely unrecognized, inquired about, or understood within the conventional and emerging trauma and trauma-informed fields. What systems can we look to when for safety, stabilization, or support when the harm and hurt we bear is their doing and being? This blog article was helpful for me as I try to make sense of and tend to my own and my communities' grief and terror. ...

Five-year-old Naja Tunney’s home is filled with books. Sometimes she will pull them from a bookshelf to read during meals. At bedtime, Naja reads to her 2-year-old sister, Hannah. “We have books anywhere you sit in the living room,” said their mother, Cheryl Tunney, who curls up with her girls on an oversized green chair to read stories. Naja and Hannah are beneficiaries of Reach Out and Read, an early intervention literacy program that collaborates with medical care providers to provide...

This article is part of WCPO's Heroin Project: How Do We Respond? Perilou Goddard is a professor of psychological science at Northern Kentucky University. Our community continues to be devastated by the epidemic of heroin and other powerful opioid drugs like illicit fentanyl. Families are torn apart, young lives once full of promise end in death or disease. We search for answers, from tougher penalties for those who sell opioids illegally to expanded access to medication-assisted treatment .

By the time a low-income child enters kindergarten in America, they’re already woefully lagging their more advantaged peers — 11 months behind in math and 13 months behind in reading, according to a recent report from the Center for American Progress. (Chart: Center for American Progress) The figure at left, from the CAP report—“How Much Can High-Quality Universal Pre-K Reduce Achievement Gaps?”—illustrates the gulf between both low- and high-income children and minority and white children.

Thursday, January 28, 2016, was a cold morning in Durham, North Carolina, and Wildin David Guillén Acosta was warming up his car as he got ready for school. He went inside for his backpack, and when he returned a group of plainclothes Immigration Custom Enforcement agents appeared at his driveway . His father watched from the window as they threw the 19-year-old to the ground and arrested him. Acosta was one of five students detained by ICE that week, and one of the hundreds detained that...

I have never been a violent person, at least not instinctively. Whenever I was teased as a child—I struggled to read for much of elementary school and wore a lot of white jeans, so I was teased a lot—I’d opt for silence or a quick joke, usually at my own expense. I’d level my aggressor with my apparent disinterest or with my words, never with my fists. All of that wit and restraint dissipated, however, whenever I saw anyone making fun of my older brother Sean. A guy doesn’t forget his first...

It’s an election year, so politicos, pundits and reporters are once again trying to figure out how the white working class will vote. Many assume that they support Donald Trump, though Nate Silver argues that Trump’s backers have relatively high incomes. The white working class also isn’t quite ready for Hillary Clinton, in part because of her Wall Street ties but also because they associate her with her husband’s policies , like NAFTA, welfare reform and mandatory sentencing for drug...

A comprehensive model of building community capacity in Washington helped make dramatic reductions in rates of health issues and social problems. The Issue In the early 1990’s, Washington state set up a program to tackle issues like domestic violence, school dropouts, youth substance abuse, and others that impact families and children. These are issues that typically had been addressed separately, but the team in Washington focused on addressing them collectively. Key Findings Over 10 to 15...